Friday, November 4, 2011

Teaser #8: “Strange Trees.”

One of the places I truly love to explore with my writing is
nature.There’s so much out there we
cannot imagine, so many possibilities; it’s vast and unlimited and mysterious
in ways we can never really know.It’s a
boon for the imaginative and willing writer.I’m willing--show me!Let me see
your heart.Let me know your
secrets!Talk to me, whisper, scream…

Let’s dance!

Okay, well, yeah, I dig nature. I particularly dig strange trees.One of my fondest fascinations.They are art of a different sort, natural,
nature wielding as a sculptor, shaping, breaking down and reconstructing. Trees in general, and strange trees in particular, are a natural wonder we should
not ignore.

This one was originally called, “Shadows and Tall Trees,”
after the U2 song.But it was changed
recently as I love the more direct title, as well as have many story ideas that
relate to this subject, even a faux anthology idea, that I may eventually work
out.(Isn’t that the way it is for all
writers, though?Juggling this idea and
that one and a novel or three, plus the short fiction and, hey, I need a story
for that anthology asap.)

Photographer Terrence Blank and his part-time girlfriend,
Mandy (it’s explained in the story), are out in the forest when she’s stricken
with her time of the month.As she wanders
off to deal with it--improvising as she must, it's also in the story, hehe--he has the time to clicks off a couple a couple more rolls with these
thoughts in his head:

***

I continued to take
pictures, really fascinated by the luminescent quality of the bone white trees
as the late afternoon sun glimmered off of them.An ambience of otherworldliness permeated my
perceptions.It even registered in my
ears, a buzzing, hypnotic drone, the hum of nature, of thousands of small
sounds gathered as mass, as something of substance, yet still tiny and
indistinct: the undercurrent of life; of dirt, foliage and sky; of insects and
animals unseen; of slowly evolving shadows and that something more that
defines silence that is not silent, its tongue is simply of a language no human
can understand.

***

Later that evening, he awakens from dreams that might be
something more than dreams. And voices. Here’s a
sample from that sequence.Yes, a double
shot of samples today.

***

“So, bad dream or
what?”

“Yeah, I
guess.Not sure, but I heard voices,
weird voices. Like…like if trees could talk, this would have been what they
sounded like.”

“That’s freaky,
especially since you were talking in your sleep.”

I raised an
eyebrow in her direction.She
continued.

“Yeah.I could hear you from the sofa—you woke me
up.I thought you must have been on the
phone or something because I could only hear part of what you were saying.Nothing really clear, but you were
talking.It was odd.That’s when I got up and came to your
door.Curiosity, you know; wondering who
you were talking to at this ungodly hour.”

I shook my head,
completely lost, disorientated.Had I
been dreaming, talking in my sleep, the words landing light as mist on my
eardrums?That would explain why I
actually thought I heard the voices, but I still could remember none of the
dream.

That’s when I
realized I could smell the blood of her in ways that defied average perceptions
or sensations.I shook my head
again.

***

Hmmm, what is up?What’s
going on?The revelations in this one,
ohhhh, they are shocking once the forest reveals its heart to Terrence.

Next, we meet Peg Saunders, a young woman with a depth of
perception that costs her so much…